One of the most valuable pay-per-inclusion
options available to web site optimization specialists as well as
growing online businesses, is an inclusion to the Inktomi search
engine.

What is Inktomi?
Despite the odd name, Inktomi is simply one of the most powerful
search engines available. Inktomi itself is not a standalone search
engine portal site like Google or AltaVista. It is however, an engine
that is used on a number of other popular search portals including
(but not limited to) the following:

How do I get my site in Inktomi?
You can get your website into Inktomi through one of two ways. You
can ask any one of their partners' sites to include your URL, or,
you can contact Position Technologies for more reliable (paid) inclusions.
(See www.positiontech.com
for more information.)

How Quickly can one Notice Inktomi
Optimization?
Inktomi sorts through its indexes to provide those searching with
results that are accurate and up-to-date. In many cases, it is not
uncommon to have Inktomi's user agent, "Slurp" accessing
your site's URL's as often as every 48 hours.

Since Inktomi comes around so often
and reviews a URL's contents, it also serves as a great tool to
watch how well your new optimization plans work. With newer
results pages for most keywords updating every few days, fine tuning
an Inktomi optimization campaign can become a very efficient process
- and create some serious results quickly.

Analyzing how Inktomi Provides Search
Results
While no one can perfectly describe how the Inktomi search algorithms
really work, a lot of information can be acquired through a number
or resources. When compiled, this information becomes very helpful
when optimizing for Inktomi's purposes.

First and foremost, are the primary
factors. In this case, primary factors are considered to be the
most influential attributes of a URL that will have an effect on
the optimization results.

While many search engines have completely
abandoned the usage of META tags, Inktomi has not.

Analyzing a Search Example Result
If you are to search within their database (Use this site for direct
Inktomi access: http://169.207.238.189/search/
), you will see that the listings appear in the following format:

In order to better understand how these
listings are generated and displayed for users, one must begin to
dissect the rather simple process- to see where search results come
from.

First off, the title of the link result
is "Countrywide Home Loans - Real
Estate Mortgage Lender - Equity Loan Mortgages".
If you look closely at the page's source code - you will see that
exact same line of text within their title tag too. No, this is
not a coincidence; it is simply the standard for establishing a
title for an Inktomi search result.

Next on the list to dissect, is the
description of the web site provided by Inktomi by those searching.
Again, and certainly not surprising - all of this data is easily
found within the document heading, under the
META - Description tag.

Of course, the URL listed at the bottom
of the listing is simply the URL that is indexed.

Factors that Affect Ranking
While the primary factors in establishing an Inktomi result are
very straight forward and simple, some secondary factors exist as
well. They are listed below, with their relationship to search results:

 Link Popularity
Both private and public research shows that Inktomi factors in Link
Popularity, or, the amount of links that do not exist on the same
domain name that point to the target (listed) URL. The more links
that are established, the more popular the page is seen through
Inktomi - and thus, is given an advantage.

Keyword Density, Relevancy,
and Importance
Residing in both your document text as well as within your META
tags, are the keywords you are looking to target. While these would
seem to be the most important factor of any optimization campaign
- it is not as important for Inktomi as it may seem.

It has been researched within WebMasterWorld
often, and recently - and the general consensus is that the keyword
density of a page should fall somewhere between 5 and 10 per cent
for any given page.

 Content
With an elementary algorithm like that used
at Inktomi, playing your way to prominent rankings can become fairly
easy. While Inktomi is an easy engine to understand and see working
though, they do claim rewards for sites that offer unique and targeted
content.

Interestingly enough, smaller pages
(those with minimal amounts of content) often appear more prominently
than other, more lengthy pages. Despite the claims that content
will dictate some affects on Inktomi - simply offer about 300 words
of text on your page - and you will at least fit in with the norm.

How to Get Optimized for Inktomi
Once you have a site that features unique content, and you have
decided upon what keywords will yield the most qualified site visitors
for that site's purpose - make sure that Inktomi knows that you
exist.

Of course, the best way to proceed
in that direction is to know that your site will in fact be spidered
every 48 - 72 hours by Slurp, Inktomi's spidering bot. In order
to know it will be coming around, subscribe to have the most resourceful
URL's spidered through Position
Technologies - positiontech.com

Once it has been spidered, make sure
to check back within the Inktomi Pure Search available at http://169.207.238.189/search/
and monitor ranking for all of your keywords as well as other possible
searches that would result in your URL being displayed.

Tune the META tags and page titles
over time, but do so carefully. Thankfully, no matter how much you
change - you can always refer back to what worked. Use the fact
that Inktomi updates so often to your advantage to maximize clickthroughs,
and be sure to find your URL listed within affiliated partners of
Inktomi. Often, they use click-popularity in sorting their results.

Good luck, and of course - If you have
any questions about this article simply email us at topsites@orbidex.com.